The Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, arrived in Tenerife this Tuesday to meet with Fernando Clavijo after a disastrous year in immigration matters
The new year has not improved the immigration situation on the islands. 2024 has begun with more than 500 arrivals in the first days of the year, more than half to Gran Canaria. Nearly 300 people are fleeing their country in search of opportunities and a better life, but at the same time putting more and more strain on the resources of an archipelago that has already been overwhelmed in 2023 with the largest migration crisis since have records, thus surpassing that of 2006.
A crisis that Fernando Clavijo has reiterated, both actively and passively, that must be treated as a matter of State and that has been addressed from the Peninsula by nodding and promising but with few actions, with more referrals and transfers between islands than to the different centers of shelters located in peninsular territory.
A crisis in which the archipelago has had allies such as the mayor of Mérida, Antonio Rodríguez Osuna, who in October of last year offered to host hundreds of migrants in his municipality. However, reluctance and “imposed solidarity” have been the general tone in recent months with some referrals to centers on the Peninsula that help, but which do not represent even 1% of what the archipelago needs to alleviate the migratory pressure that suffers daily.
For this reason, the new Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, has arrived in the Canary Islands these first days of the year to address this issue. A visit that she began in Tenerife by visiting migrant camps and meeting with Fernando Clavijo and members of the regional Executive to address the referral of migrants to peninsula territory, specifically migrant minors.
“The Government fulfills what it promises,” Saiz stated before the media referring to this issue, thus ensuring that the distribution of migrant minors between the Autonomous Communities will be mandatory. A measure that will not solve the migration crisis but, if true, will alleviate the pressure on assistance in the archipelago given the daily arrivals that are being experienced.
A “patch” while looking anxiously towards Brussels waiting for the European migration pact to continue taking steps towards its confirmation, which would mean the transfer of 30.000 migrants a year to states less exposed to arrivals among other measures that They aim to give a respite to the main areas that receive migrants daily.
An agreement that is not perfect and which, as political figures such as Fernando Clavijo or Ángel Víctor Torres have stated, lacks “fringe” (especially in humanitarian matters) but which at least makes visible a glimmer of agreement in Europe before an issue that has the Canary Islands on the ropes.
